Windows Mobile 6 and the CE OS

Windows Mobile 6 and the CE OS

Now that WM6 is publicly announced, I want to start taking steps to prevent confusion about one detail that is pretty major to most people who read this blog. Windows Mobile 6 does NOT run the CE 6 OS. Technically the OS version # in WM6 is 5.02; it's an advancement of the OS (5.01) that was in WM5. Certain CE6 OS features have been ported to WM6. But the kernel VM architecture we've been discussing here does NOT apply to Windows Mobile 6.

Why on earth would it be this way? Well, the two projects were essentially developed in parallel. The CE6 OS work happened in an embedded only context, while people were off working on the latest greatest WM6 features at the same time. It let us get WM6 underway without having to port the Windows Mobile code to the as-yet-unreleased (at the time) CE6 kernel.

So to all of you who wonder "why aren't there more high level features in CE6" it's because all those people you might have expected to be working on CE6 were working on WM6. And if you wonder "why wasn't there more low level OS work in WM6" it's because those people were mostly working on CE6. And if you wonder "why are they both 6," well... it is fun to blame marketing. :-)